I don’t know how to “self-care” my way through this

Photo by Max van den Oetelaar on Unsplash

Let me start with this: I know it is important. I am just frustrated because I don’t know how it’s possible. Self-care has become one of those terms we throw around in an effort to be aware. Don’t stay home from work because we can’t give you sick leave. Please catch every curveball with grace. Be a team player — don’t expect extra pay for extra work. And finally, please take care of yourself. Because no one else will and we can’t afford for you to have a breakdown. All of these great self-help tools, meditation, mindfulness, breathing exercises, are being handed out like responsibilities meant to handle life circumstances that are increasingly untenable. I know things are hard, but if you could just stay in the moment, you could get through this broken system without causing too much trouble. That is not always the sentiment, but it feels like self-help has become a way to reverse responsibility for individual well being. And that is frustrating.

I know I am not alone here. It seems that every person I talk to lately is hanging on by a thread. I read on Twitter yesterday that the hardest thing about the pandemic is not the disease, but the people. There is a certain amount of bubble mentality when things are “normal.” We have our friends, our routines, all comfortable and familiar. Now we are in a situation where we all need to work together, cooperate on…